Unherd vaccine6/10/2023 ![]() ![]() The Lancet recently published a study of more than 3.4 million Kaiser Permanente members, both vaccinated and not, reviewing the effectiveness of the Pfizer vaccine. and abroad show that time elapsed since vaccination also plays a role. More people are traveling and going into situations they would have avoided a year ago. Nearly a year later, restrictions - including mask rules - have loosened in many areas. was under tighter pandemic-related stay-at-home rules. A few have also raised concerns that protection against serious illness may also be diminished, particularly in older people and patients with underlying medical conditions.įirst, when the vaccines were authorized, much of the U.S. Yes, decline in effectiveness against infection is seen in some studies. What it means is that a fully vaccinated person exposed to the virus faces only 5% of the risk of infection compared with an unvaccinated person. Keep in mind, also, that the annual influenza vaccine’s real-world effectiveness is often 40% to 50%.Īnother point: 95% effectiveness doesn’t mean 95% of vaccinated people will never get infected. Those numbers exceeded the 50% threshold health officials sought as a minimum for COVID vaccine efficacy. The Johnson & Johnson single-dose shot - which was tested later, when there were more variants - reported overall efficacy in the high 60% range. When authorized for emergency use following clinical trials, both the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna two-dose vaccines reported efficacy against symptomatic illness in the mid-90% range. That real-world performance measure is called effectiveness. In the real world, however, a drug or vaccine’s performance is affected by numerous factors, including a much larger population receiving it, some of whom have underlying conditions or socioeconomic circumstances different from those in the clinical trial. Those clinical trial results are often referred to as efficacy measures. In the case of a vaccine, they look at how well it prevents infection, and whether it protects against serious illness, hospitalization or death. Then researchers compare how the groups fare. So, what do “efficacy” and “effectiveness” mean, anyway?īefore a drug or vaccine is greenlighted by federal regulators, it is tested on volunteers randomly assigned to get either the product or a placebo. Amesh Adalja, an infectious-disease physician and senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security. “When it comes to what matters, vaccines hold up really well,” said Dr. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently published a study showing fully vaccinated people were more than 10 times less likely to die or be hospitalized than the unvaccinated. reduces the chance of getting infected in the first place, and significantly cuts the risk of hospitalization or death if you do contract COVID-19. The bottom line? Getting vaccinated with any of the three vaccines available in the U.S. and abroad generally show protection weakening slightly, particularly in older or sicker people, but remaining strong overall, even with the rise of the more infectious delta variant of the COVID virus. But on key measures - prevention of serious illness, hospitalization and death - real-world studies from the U.S. ![]() Effectiveness in preventing infection - defined as a positive test result - appears in some studies to wane sharply the more time that goes by after completing the one- or two-shot regimen. If you don’t read any further, know this: No vaccine is 100% effective against any disease. Still, one can’t help but wonder what’s really going on with effectiveness - and is any of it a surprise? In short, the video fosters misperceptions by mixing together dissimilar data points and leaving out key details. Some are about vaccines not offered in the U.S. Some are reporting on studies that looked only at infection rates others, more serious outcomes, including hospitalization and death. Set to the rapidly increasing tempo of the orchestral piece “In the Hall of the Mountain King,” the video ends with headlines about drug company profits.īut slowing the video to parse the headlines reveals more complexity. Anthony Fauci extolling their protectiveness with screenshots of news headlines, starting with those citing 100% effectiveness, then moving through others reporting sharply lower percentages. This one intersperses comments from White House medical adviser Dr. The politicization of COVID vaccines - and, well, just about everything else having to do with the pandemic - has led to confusion, if not utter fatigue.Īnd some posts circulating on social media - this slickly edited piece on YouTube, for example - seem to build on these feelings, attempting to cast doubt on the effectiveness of the vaccines. ![]()
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